No Shadow on the Snow
by WereDonkey
Summary: Derek wakes up. For a moment, just a moment, everything is fine.


Derek wakes up.

For a moment, just a moment, everything is fine.

The pillow is soft beneath his face. The blankets, bunched and twisted around his legs, are warm and comfortable. There is sunlight, the very early morning kind that peeks just above the horizon, gentle and pale. It warms his arms, his chest, his face. He sighs, turns his face into it. Softly, he smiles. He can see the light through his closed eyelids, turning the blackness red. Some memory flares but he pushes it back, his brows furrowing.

Then, he takes a breath. The scents rush in and he remembers.

He stiffens, hand contorting into fists, griping the sheets tight. The smile still remains, frozen on his face. It is a broken shadow of what it had been though, all light behind it vanished.

He rolls away from the light, curls in on himself drawing his knees up to his chest. His hands grip at his hair and he lets the wolf out to howl.

* * *

No one had expected it. No one had ever thought Stiles could ever be considered their weak point. He just seemed so confident, so integral and powerful and just _there_. But they should have known something like this would have happened.

Should have known that Stiles would never sit back, would never stay at home to wait. Not while his friends, _his pack_, was out risking their lives. That just wasn't who he was.

Lydia had explained to him that it would be best for him to sit this one out. As a banshee, her screams would actually cause harm to the faeries. Stiles' magic powders, on the other hand, would have no effect against them, being magic themselves. Isaac had agreed, pointing out that even his baseball bat would not help him in this particular fight.

When he continued to argue, Scott had played the alpha card. Ordered him to stay home and stay safe. Peter had simply huffed in amusement and turned to look out the window. Derek stayed quiet.

When they had turned to leave, Stiles had stayed. He had been sulking a little, arms folded over his chest and face drawn down in a pout, but he sat still as they filed out the door to battle. Derek had been last to go, his gaze lingering on the back of his head before he closed the door behind him.

The thing was he _hadn't _stayed. Not for long anyway. He showed up for battle as he always did, with his baseball bat in hand and his powders in vials lining the pockets of his jeans and his hoodie.

No matter that this threat was not something he could defend himself against. No matter that he would be so vulnerable, that this was not a battle he could participate in and win. Not because he was weak, but because this was what the monsters wanted.

* * *

The smells in the room remind Derek of ashes. It smells like grief and failure and regret. The scent of blood hangs heavy in the air. Tangy and metallic like iron, with the underlying scent that was just _him_. That was pack and safety and _hope_.

Derek can't stand it.

He jolts from the bed, his hands wipe sporadically at his face, over his eyes, his nose, through his hair.

He jerks from the room. The smells follow him, a shadow. He escapes through the door into the hall. He shakes his head, as if trying to loosen the smell from his nose. It's still there.

He crumples down the corridor, pushing off walls and doors, hands shaking, legs jolty and weak. There, a drop of blood mixing into the faded carpet, dark and dirty. They must have missed it.

_His_ scent surrounds and swallows him, follows him down the hallway, down the stairs. It's crushing him down and down. He's choking, he can't breathe through it. It's twisting his chest tighter and tighter. He can't breathe at all.

Suddenly, he escapes into fresh air. Into the cold, early morning. The door bangs shut behind him as he stumbles forward.

An icy wind bites at his skin, whips at his shirt. Derek collapses onto the ground, back against the wall in the alleyway. He grips at his head and breathes.

He just breathes. Deep, through his mouth. He can taste the smells: the freshness of morning, the sharpness of evergreen leaves, the bitterness of brewing coffee. They're familiar, comforting. He counts them off, lets them wash over him, drown out the other scent.

It's snowed again, the night before. He can feel it melting against his thigh, the damp and cold seeping into his clothes, into his skin and his bones. He doesn't move though. He doesn't care.

* * *

It started with pets. Reports of people's dogs and cats and rabbits and stuff going missing. It doesn't _seem_ supernatural but Stiles had insisted they check it out nonetheless. Never too sure, he had said.

Of course, it turned out he was right and a tribe of faeries had been 'borrowing' pets to use in their freaky moonlit ceremony things.

Scott, being sensitive to such things as animal sacrifice, had asked the tribe kindly, as alpha and thus in control of this territory, to vacate the woods and find some different animal guts to look at, preferably not someone's pets. And of course, because this was Beacon Hills and it was _them_, this did not go down well with the Fae Queen and a fight ensued.

But after, it had seemed as though all was said and done. The pack had won the fight and the faeries had retreated. It seemed as though they would leave and everything would be fine.

But animals kept disappearing. And then the wolves kept scenting fae around town. Derek could tell the pack was being watched, assessed.

But he hadn't thought that they would pick _Stiles_ as the weakest link. That they would use him, as their most vulnerable member, against the pack.

* * *

Derek knows he should get up. That he should go back inside, keep cleaning, try and scrub away the last of that scent. The others had done a pretty good job, cleaning the blood from the floor, disposing of the soaked sheet, righting the furniture and putting the loft back to how it used to be.

But they still did not have the knowledge of born wolves about cleaning out scents. That he would have to do himself.

He should get up and do it now. Do it soon so that when they gathered again, tonight probably, the wolves would not have to smell the blood of their lost pack. So that Scott would not have to relive the death of his best friend. He should shield them from that pain. He might not be the alpha anymore but they're all just kids. He should be able to protect them. Like he should have protected Stiles.

He can't bring himself to stand, though. To go back in there where he would again suffocate in the stench of death and regret. He doesn't think he'd have the strength to move anyway.

Derek feels his claws grow again, pressing in against his head, his teeth elongating and cutting into his lip. He tastes blood and feels sick to his stomach. He knows he should will them back, push down on the wolf until it again sits still in the back of his mind. He doesn't though.

A shudder runs through his body violently. His hands are still shaking. He wishes they'd stop shaking. Maybe if they didn't shake, he would have the strength to stand up, to help his pack like he should have when he had been the alpha. But he can't. Can't make them stop no matter how hard he clenches them into fists, no matter how hard he pushes them against his skull.

His palms feel wet. He pulls them back, brings them up to his face. He blinks at them for a moment. They are bleeding. His claws have cut into the skin, leaving small half-moons, ragged and leaking. He watches as they heal, feels nothing.

The blood looks too much like his. His scent still lingers in his nose. He's finding it hard to remember that the red that stains his hands is his _own _blood. Not Stiles'. All of Stiles' has been washed away, taken along with his cold, empty body.

He wipes them roughly against the ground. The white snow is stained red. Again. He closes his eyes tight against the image. Red is not a good colour.

Derek wonders, dully, what the pack will tell his father. What the sheriff will tell the town. He supposes it doesn't really matter. Stiles is gone, and that won't change no matter what they say happened to him.

* * *

The first attack wasn't very successful. They came at him while he stood alone, at his jeep after lacrosse. But he wasn't as alone as they had thought. Scott and Isaac had arrived within seconds, had the faeries retreating a minute later.

It gave them a misplaced sense of superiority. It made them arrogant when they had no right to be. Now, they thought they'd have no problem fending the faeries off. If they had not let this go to their heads maybe it would have ended differently.

On their next attempt, the faeries had ensured that no wolves were around. But Scott had warned them all to be prepared. Allison had grinned as her arrows made quick work of the fae soldier that had tried to sneak up on her and Stiles as they had trekked to their favourite sparring spot in the woods. The pack's confidence against the threat increased.

The third attempt had been much closer. Stiles, having left his attack spells at home, had stood inside a circle of mountain ash for three hours being taunted and threaten by the faeries until the wolves had found him to frighten them away.

Lydia had been livid, backed up quietly by a scowling Derek. She had railed at him, demanding to know how he had been stupid enough to _not _bring his weapons, considering there was a threat that was clearly targeting _him_ specifically. Derek had just stood behind her shoulder, arms crossed, glaring Stiles into submission.

Stiles, for his part, had just stood there and let her rave, accepted the dark looks Derek sent his way and then answered that it didn't matter, he was fine, nothing had gone wrong and everyone should stop worrying about him.

After that, Scott had had enough. Stiles obviously didn't understand just how much this was a problem. Scott wanted this over as soon as possible. He didn't want to kill them, but he recognised Peter's counsel as their best option, opting for an 'offence as the best defence' approach.

They had gathered at Derek's loft, as they always did in times of crisis even though he was no longer the alpha. Together, they had drawn plans to eliminate the threat.

* * *

Derek feels distantly grateful that no one in and around his building woke early. He doesn't want to have to explain why, exactly, he is curled up in a ball in the snow.

His wolf is howling again. It wants to be let out, to be freed to run, to find his pack and howl their grief together at the moon.

His mother always said that they were not animals, that their human side made them more than that. But right now, he finds it hard to believe her. He doesn't feel human, not without Stiles, not with this emptiness crushing his chest, slowly filling him with grief and helplessness, suffocating him.

Derek decides he doesn't _want_ to be human. Not when it means there is so much pain and no way of letting it out. He can't cry anymore. His tears have completely dried out. He does not even have the energy to sob, to rage. He just stays cowered, arms wrapped tight around his head, shaking.

He doesn't know how long he stays there. Long enough for the sun to make its way from the horizon up into the sky, above the roof tops. The snow is melting. People are moving, beginning their days.

Finally, Derek manages to stand. But instead of going back inside, as he had promised he would do, he turns towards the woods. He is drawn almost without conscious thought to where it seeps in between the concrete and steel of the city, peeking out behind the buildings at the end of the street.

When he passes through into the dark shade of the trees, it's like he enters a whole new world. He lets his wolf out. He surrenders all control to his instincts and lets the change rip though his body before racing away into the trees.

* * *

It had been Lydia, ever logical and reasonable even when she had thought she'd lost her mind, who had suggested that Stiles stay behind.

Derek had been grateful. He hadn't wanted to be the one to push it, he knew Stiles would have only argued that much harder against it if he had.

But of course he hadn't listened. He never did, not when his own safety was the concern.

Not five minutes after the confrontation had turned into full scale battle and bloodshed, Derek had heard the unmistakable clunking of his Jeep rolling down the road through the forest towards them.

Glancing around, he had seen that Scott, too, had recognised the noise for what it was. Scott had tried to call out to his friend, to stop him, but his human ears would not have heard about the noise of the fighting.

Derek had watched helplessly as Stiles had come running into the clearing, baseball bat in hand, his face set in determination. Ready to fight for and with his pack.

The faeries Derek had been facing had grinned on noticing the newcomer, on noticing Derek's panic at his arrival. The others had seen him now too, stomping through the snow towards the fight and as the pack had fought to reach him, a fae soldier's dagger did first.

* * *

Derek closes his eyes as he runs. He lets his other sense and his instincts work to take him deeper into the forest's embrace.

He breathes deep. Lets the fresh smell of the leaves, the bark, the snow clean his senses of the scent of blood. Lets the feel of the sun's rays seeping through the foliage warm his face.

He tries to clear his mind, to let the wolf take over so that he can get some respite from this feeling of emptiness. But the wolf feels it too. It recognises the loss of pack, of friend, of _more_.

He runs faster, pushes harder. He's no longer just running. He's running away.

* * *

What the faeries hadn't realised was that, despite perhaps being the most vulnerable in a fight having no claws or arrows or screams with which to harm the magic creatures, Stiles was very much protected by the pack.

Having seen their pack-mate fall to his knees, having scented his blood spilling into the clean air, the wolves became almost feral. Not stopping until every fae soldier was lying dead or wounded in the snow and their Queen was on her knees, begging for mercy and pledging that they would never step foot in these woods again, deferring ownership of the territory to the alpha.

Scott had barely been able to hold on, to stand still as the Fae Queen begged for her life and the lives of her people when Stiles was crumpling forward onto the ground. But, being the kind hearted boy he was, he let them go. Derek did not think he would have had the strength for that much mercy.

The creatures had left, quickly, racing through the trees and the pack had turned to where Stiles knelt on the other side of the clearing. He had pulled the dagger free and was inspecting it, ever curious even as his other hand was clasped over the wound in a vain attempt at staunching the flow of blood.

He'd looked up at them then, glanced around at each of his pack in turn as they collapsed around him, Lydia grasping his hand hard in her own as Isaac and Allison sank down on his other side, pushing against the bleeding wound. Peter had lingered a little further back, watching the edges of the clearing warily.

His eyes had lingered longer on Scott's face, his expression almost apologetic as Scott fell forward onto his knees to grasp at him. Then, he'd turned to Derek, glancing up at him from where the wolf had pulled him into his chest. His mouth had pulled up at the side in a faltering, wry smile.

"Cursed blade," he'd choked out on a cough, blood dripping from his mouth to stain the clean white snow a stark red.

Derek did not remember much after that. Only snapshots. He did know that he had not let go of Stiles, had kept one hand clasped over the wound and the other wrapped tightly around his hand, Stiles' back cradled against his chest.

Somehow they had made it back to his jeep, then to the loft and onto the couch. Stiles had fallen unconscious somewhere along the way but Derek had not let go, had not stopped murmuring softly to him, telling him it was fine, that he was ok, that he _had_ to be ok.

The pack did not question Derek's grip on Stiles' hand, nor try to ease him away from the boy. The issue they all had avoided, pretended to be oblivious to, had let them dance around for so long was simply accepted without comment.

Allison and Lydia had tried their best on the wound, the wolves taking turns draining his pain, although he would not wake up.

Deaton had been called. And then sent away when he said there was nothing to be done. He'd said that his spirit was already gone, that is was just his body holding on. Scott had raged at him, yelled and demanded that he _do_ something but the veterinarian had merely shaken his head, his eyes sad.

Sometime in the night, Lydia had gently prised Derek's hand from Stiles cold one. Derek was so drained, he couldn't resist. With help from Isaac, they had taken him to his bed and told him to sleep. He didn't count the heartbeats in the room, he couldn't bring himself to.

The pack had left then, Allison curled protectively around Scott as ragged sobs wracked his frame. He listened as their sounds receded and he was left in silence.

Derek couldn't sleep at first. He simply stared at the ceiling and tried not to breath in the scent of blood.

Peter, Isaac, and Lydia had returned at some point. He had heard them murmuring, moving about, Lydia and Isaac sniffling occasionally. He'd listened, eyes closed, as they'd cleaned the loft, the smell of cleaning fluid, and tears and pack permeating the air, mixing with blood and grief.

They had taken Stiles away and left again, checking in on Derek only once. Peter had stroked a hand briefly through his hair, gentle in a way he had not been since Derek was a child. They did not say anything as they left though, assuming he was asleep.

He hadn't minded. He hadn't really wanted to talk to them anyway.

* * *

He runs and runs until he can't go any further. He drops to his knees, breathing hard and fast, his limbs shaking from exertion.

The sun has sunk low in the sky, creeping below the horizon, red and orange bleeding into the darkening sky. He can feel the moon as it begins to rise. He's been running much longer than he thought.

The snow is still thick beneath the trees, protected from the sun's bright rays during the day by the shade of the branches and leaves. Derek grasps a handful, holding it and watching as it melts in his palm as he steadies his breathing.

The snow is turning to liquid quickly against the heat of his skin, dripping down between his fingers even as he tries to grasp it. He lets out a bark of humourless laughter. The metaphor is not lost on him.

He lets his hand fall back to the ground, the last of the slush dripping away. He raises his face to the sky, wonders why he can never keep a hold on the things that make him feel safe, at home. Happy.

It's getting colder as the sunlight dwindles. His breath is coming out in front of his face in little puffs of fog. He closes his eyes against the memory of Stiles messing around, yelling something or other about being a dragon breathing fire. It's was happy memory, but it's also painful now. Like his memories of his parents or Laura. Even those of Cora, now she's decided to leave them.

Derek shakes his head, tries to dislodge those thoughts. It does not do to dwell on all he has lost, he has learnt. And he has lost _so_ much. His family and pack torn from his hands by someone he had trusted so explicitly. His sister and alpha taken by his uncle, and then his uncle by his own hand. And then, when things had seemed to be looking up, when it seemed as though he might finally be healing, he had lost his new pack and then his alpha status. The loss of Boyd and Erica, even though they had left his pack beforehand still feels raw, a hole in his chest. Then after having only just found her again, Cora decides she is better off on her own and leaves again. And yeah, she calls but it's not enough, not after losing so much.

He has been used and abused by so many and had so much taken from him and every time, every single time, he finds something – _someone_ – that can help piece him back together, they too must be taken away. Stiles had been there from the start of everything after Laura. And yeah, maybe they had not always seen eye-to-eye, not always seen each other for the allies they were. But they had ended up trusting each other, had _saved each other's lives_ on more than one occasion. And through everything that had happened, the _only_ person who had stuck with him through everything had been _Stiles_. Not Scott, not his pack, not Peter his _uncle_. Stiles. A teenage boy who by all rights did not even have to be involved in this world, who didn't even have to _care_. And yet he did.

Derek draws in a shuddering breath. Stiles can't truly be gone. He can't. Derek simply cannot go on if he is gone. How is he supposed to go on if he is gone?

He pushes clumsily to his feet, his legs unsteady beneath his weight. He stumbles forward, no direction in mind just one thought tolling through his head like a bell: he isn't gone, he can't be gone.

"I've got to go find him," he tells the wind, staggering between the trees. "He's around here somewhere I know he is. It's fine. I'll find him and everything will be okay again."

I'll find him. I'll find him.

He's fine.

Somehow he stumbles into the clearing where they had fought the faeries. Stiles' scent still hangs heavy in the air, mixing with the smell of faery blood and magic, burnt bark and snow, but still standing out strong and sharp.

Derek chokes on a sob. He is gone, truly gone, and he is never coming back and nothing Derek did would change that.

Derek's knees give way beneath him and he slumps to the ground. Dimly, he thinks he has done that a lot today. A tear escapes his eye and slips warm down his cold cheek.

He never even got the chance to tell him. To tell him how grateful he was for all he had done for him. How much he cared for him and how much he wished to be for him. They'd danced around each other too long, lost the opportunity to voice what they both _knew_ to be true.

Derek is pulled from his thoughts as a shiver tears through his body. He frowns, glancing around. That should not happen. Werewolves run at higher temperatures to ordinary humans; this weather should not be affecting him how it is. And yet there are goose bumps raised up and down his arms, his teeth are chattering. He almost can't feel his fingertips.

Something is wrong.

Sharply, he looks up, head twisting from side to side. He's certain he heard something. He holds his breath, tries to calm his loudly beating heart, to stay quiet. If the faeries have returned he really does not want to get caught out here alone, no matter how much he wants to rip out their throats.

He hears it again, a whisper on the wind. He snaps his eyes to the left, towards the noise. He squints in the dimming light, his eyes catching the faintest bit of movement between the trees at the edge of the clearing.

Slowly, warily, he moves up into a defensive crouch, facing the tree line. He lets out a low growl in warning, letting his features shift back to wolf, teeth and claws extending. "Who's there?" he calls.

He shivers again as his voice echoes back around him in the empty clearing. "Hello?" It's distorted by his chattering teeth. He's never been this cold before. He needs to get out of this cold, he needs to get warm.

He hears it again, so, so quiet, barely louder than the wind. He thinks he recognises the voice. He thinks it calls his name. Derek shakes his head, his eyes burning. Wishful thinking, he thinks as he blinks back tears.

He turns to go, wrapping his arms tight around his chest, curling in on himself to fight both the cold and the pain in this chest. And then it comes again, still like a breath of wind but louder. It's certainly his name.

Derek spins again, eyes flashing in every direction, looking for any evidence that what his ears tell him is true. That it could be possible. He squints against the darkness, but it does nothing, not even his wolf eyes can pick out anything between the trees.

"Stiles?" he whispers, his voice breaking. "Is that- Is that you?" The forest is silent again. He's shivering much more violently, barely even able to control his fingers. Tears are slipping from his eyes and freezing on his cheeks. He knows it's not but he needs it to be true.

Tremors are tearing through his body now, shaking and shifting his joints. It's too cold, it's too cold. He closes his eyes against the pain, it's so much worse than the change. He falls to all fours and his head rears back in loud feral roar.

As the pain fades, he feels warm, as if he is wearing a big coat. When he opens his eyes again, he is staring at paws. Big wolf paws, covered in thick dark charcoal fur. He startles back and they move with him. They are his. He lets out a whine of surprise.

"Derek!"

Derek yips in answer and spins around, stumbling a bit on four legs. Standing before him just outside the clearing is Stiles. He's in the same clothes he wore to the fight the night he– the night he left. He's paler than usual but there's no blood now. He's smiling.

"Derek," he says again. "It's you- you… you're a wolf, like a full wolf. Could you always do that?"

Derek sits back, his eyes wide. He tries to answer but all that comes out is a short bark. He frowns, but it doesn't feel right. He shakes his head, this has never happened before; he didn't even know he could. He thinks maybe Stiles gets the jist because he nods.

"It's so good to see you, man," he says as his grin widens. He strides forward towards the clearing. "I've been wandering around the forest all day. Couldn't seem to find a way out. Every time I thought I'd found the road, walked to the edge of the forest, it turned out I was just in this clearing again. I think I've been walking in circles. Knew you guys'd find me eventually, though."

Derek just stares, watching him move forward into the empty air. He startles back, eyes wide.

"Derek?" Stiles says, smile dropping as he reaches out a hand in concern. "What's wrong, dude?"

Derek shakes his head minutely, watching as the moonlight filters through Stiles' transparent skin. He backs away even as Stiles steps closer, willing it not to be true, begging with any god he can think of that if he has to be gone, could he at least be truly gone and at peace. Not this, anything but this.

"Derek, it's me. Calm down, it's okay. Come on, man, tell me what's up. Where is everyone? Didn't we have a faery problem to take care of?"

Derek whines, his ears flattening back against his head. Stiles doesn't know. He doesn't know that he's dead. That he's a ghost. That he's trapped in the forest where he died, possibly forever. That his pack: Peter, Isaac and Allison and Lydia, his best friend Scott, _his dad _–will never be able to see him again.

Derek sees the exact moment that Stiles' sight catches his out stretched hand. His eyes widen, his mouth hanging open with shock. He turns his hand in the beam of moonlight, watching entranced as the light filters through his pale palm to the ground. He casts no shadow.

"Derek," he says again, glancing back up briefly before returning to staring at his hands, his arms, his torso, hands gripping at himself making solid contact where the moonlight will not. "Derek," he calls again. He is almost pleading now, his brows screwed together and his mouth turned down. He's confused and he's scared and he wants someone to explain what's happening.

Derek wants to help him, to comfort him but doesn't know what to do. He lets out a yelp, but he can't make himself understood. Stiles glances up at the noise and the look is his eyes is so helpless and desperate and sad that Derek knows he's figured it out. He's always been smart, perceptive. Always so quick to make the connections and put things together and now is no different. Derek's already shattered heart breaks again. He lets out another whine, rushing forward in an attempt to comfort him.

But they cannot touch. Stiles' hand passes through Derek's snout and he shivers and sneezes at the contact. Stiles stumbles back in shock, falling to his butt in the snow but leaving no imprint. His eyes are wide and he's shaking his head.

"No," he says, his voice brittle. "Derek, please tell me I'm not… I don't remember… I can't be de– " Stiles voice cracks at the last, like he cannot say it. Derek whines again, his eyes burn but wolves cannot cry. "What about my dad, Derek? What about Scott and the pack?" His voice is thick now, tears streaming off his face but never landing on the snow beneath him. "I can't just _leave_ them."

Derek curls protectively around him where he sits slumped on the ground. He's careful not to touch, not to emphasis to Stiles his new situation, but he curls close enough that he can feel the cold radiating from his form. He tries to make soothing noises as Stiles sobs into his hands, no longer able to form words, but he ends up adding his voice to Stiles' grief, letting go the howls he has held in since that night.

He doesn't know how much time has passed when they both fall quiet once again. It may have been hours, it may have only been minutes. It's dark. The sun had sunk completely below the horizon and the moon is high in the sky. Even through his wolf eyes, he cannot see very far.

Stiles stands slowly and Derek follows. Stiles turns to look down at Derek, he offers a small half smile. His eyes still look so sad.

"The others," he says, his voice hoarse. "They won't be able to see me, will they?" Derek doesn't say anything because he can't. He just holds Stiles' gaze and tries to convey how very sorry he is. Stiles shakes his head as he turns away, shifting his gaze to the stars above them. "I did some research after I found out about your mum's ability. I was interested to see if it was genetic. If there were any other abilities wolves could have."

Derek looks down. He still doesn't like thinking too much about his mother. How he failed her, so many times.

"It is genetic," Stiles says, glancing back at him with a soft smile. "Sometimes it skips and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes takes something big to make it show. Like being frozen almost to death by a ghost, I suppose." He chuckles and it seems almost normal but his grin falls too quickly and he turns back to the sky with a sigh. Derek stays quiet.

"There are abilities that come with the shift to full wolf too. Like the ability to almost communicate with animals." He pauses for a moment, fiddles with the drawstrings of his hoodie. "And the ability to see ghosts." Derek nods his head, acknowledging that he knew this already. "But only in full wolf form. They can still hear the ghosts, if faintly, as a human but can only see them as a wolf." Derek looks up at him again, watching how his honey-coloured eyes no longer catch the light, no longer sparkle with life and amusement. The light passes through them now, as it does everything else about him. They look flat and empty. Dead.

"It's kinda a catch-22 though," Stiles says with a humourless bark of laughter. He looks angry now, glaring at the sky like he's trying to pick a fight with the universe. "Because, yeah you can see the dead guy, but it's not like you can touch him. It's not like you can talk to him, tell him what happened, how to _fix_ this."

Stiles spins to face him, arms spread wide, face so full of anger that Derek takes a step back. "How do I fix this, Derek? Am I stuck here in this forest forever?" His voice is growing vicious. "What about if you move on, Derek? What then? What about when you die? Will I be stuck here for the rest of eternity? Alone? Forgotten?" The anger leaks out of his voice and he lets his arms drop to hang useless at his sides. Again he is left with only desperation and hopelessness. Derek whines. He thinks the lost look in his eyes is worse than the fury. "What am I supposed to do, Derek?" he's begging. "What am I supposed to do?"

Derek shakes his head. He doesn't know. There's nothing he can do for him.

He shakes himself, head to tail, shakes the change away, strips the fur from his body to crouch cold again in the snow.

He looks at where he last saw Stiles standing. There is nothing for his eyes to see. No footprints in the snow, no shadow.

"I don't know, Stiles. I'm so sorry," he shakes his head. His eyes harden then, his voice forceful. "But I'll be here with you every day until I die. I won't forget you and I will _never_ leave you."

He closes his eyes once more, lets the change take over him again. When he is once more shrouded in fur he glances up at Stiles, his ears drooped back in question.

_Is this okay?_ He wants to ask. It's all he can offer.

Stiles presses his lips together likes he's holding something back. He nods. Sitting again in the snow, he looks back at him, his eyes so young. "Forever?"

Derek curls around him once more. There are words still left unsaid but the time for them has passed. All they have is this.

He looks up into cold amber eyes. He nods his head.

_Forever_.


End file.
